Audio Tape 1 Side 1
<hr>
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Out of Kentucky I'm Colonel Arthur L. Kelley. Morgan was in WWII
he was with the famous Company D, of the 192nd tank battalion, from
Harrodsburg, KY.  that was fought the delaying action in Luzon and
subsequently captured, some participated in the death march, some were
captured at Corregidor and, in the case of Morgan, he was captured at
Fort Drum, of which we'll find out a little more.
<p>
He went from there to Cabanatuan #3 and stayed there about 2 years and
a half until November 1942.  and then, on the Hell Ship, took a ride
to Japan, to the main island.  And spent the rest of the war on that
island, Honshu.  Lets just start now....
<p>
You're joining Company D ?
<p>
<a href="morgan1.WAV"><img src="casett2.gif">(188K)</a>
<em>MF:</em> <016>In 1937 we were having a big flood around KY.  Down in
Frankfort it was flooding quite a bit, and some of the guys talked to
me about joining the National Guard.  Well I thought it was a pretty
good idea too, because living on the farm we weren't making a lot of
money and I wanted to make a little extra.  So I joined the Guard
12-March-1937 and we made monday night drills real regular and then
they had a strike up in Harlan County.  That was the first duty I seen
was going up in Harlan County and preventing them people from killing
each other.  Then from that we go to the Derby every year.  We had a
good time going down there.  Then we'd go to Fort Knox two weeks out
of the year and train with the regular Army, doing our tank training.
At that time I was a tank driver and I ended up being a tank crewman.
We had a pretty good time, at that time.  So in November 1940, thats
when the Japanese, I mean, everything was getting pretty serious.
Germany was attacking everybody in the Country, so they federalized
the 38th tank company which thats what we were at that particular
time.  November, I think it was the 25th, we all went to Harrodsburg
and gathered there and stayed a couple of days because we had to get
out of the National Guard and re-enlist in the Army.  And after that
we traveled to Fort Knox.  They put us in tents for a while, because
they were building all new barracks at Fort Knox at that particular
time.  And what really made it so bad, it was winter time and it got
real cold, and we were getting all our trainees in to give them basic
training.  And I tell you, it was really something to see these young
men coming from down in the lower parts of KY, some of their hair was
down to their shoulders and some of the uniforms didn't fit them, some
of them had World War One uniforms issued to them!  Anyway, we trained
them and moved to other barracks.  After we got all our basic trainees
trained, then we started training with our equipment.  We got tanks,
trucks, jeeps, motorcycles, and all the equipment that we needed.
Then we started going out on the post, the reservation, and staying
weeks at a time, training, and training, and training!
<p>
And in the meantime, I went to the Armor School, went to track field
mechanics school.  From that time on I was pretty well stuck in the
maintenance section.  Thats what I did all during my Army career, in
the maintenance section.  With the exceptions of a few times.  I ended
up at various units doing minor things, but not.. but I still stayed
in the maintenance field.
<p>
Then in September.. no August, 1941 we went to Louisiana (?? <058>) on
maneuvers.  Then, I was in the maintenance field, I was crew chief in
the maintenance section.  A guy name of Wallace Denny was actually the
motor sergeant in our company.  I was, more or less, maintenance under
him.  In those days the motor sergeant didn't do nothing, he went
around dressed up all the time and his crew chief took care of all his
problems. So I was SOP and nobody else thought anything about it.  We
went through Louisiana maneuvers really thinking everything was
screwed up but come to find out General Patton picked us out being the
best tank battalion, as far as the National Guard went down in
Louisiana on maneuvers.  Then we were scheduled to go to the
Philippines.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> <067> Let me ask you one question here, Did you all get some
training on tanks prior to coming on active duty?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> You mean in the National Guard? Yeah, oh yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> In other words, did your officers have some training on tactics and
the NCOs?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, well in two weeks we come Fort Knox.  We'd go under the
supervision of the regular army and went through maneuvers with units
of the regular army.  So, if we'd goof up they would correct us...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You mean during the two weeks training...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, uh hm. During the two weeks, we weren't on our own. We had
regular army personnel with us all the time.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> So you were tankers by the time you came on active duty.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh yeah,
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Skilled drivers, and skilled gunners, and skilled maintenance men,
and skilled chiefs.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh yeah. lets see, we had 66 men in a company, and all of them was
pretty well trained in whatever their job was.  Tank driver, tank
commanders, crewman, radio operators, and all that.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You said you thought that the company was sort of screwed up,
what'd you mean by that?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh, the reason I say that is that we'd have blackouts, and, well
we didn't get nobody hurt, but a lot of the other units got motorcycle
riders killed, because in a blackout they'd fall over at night and the
tanks would run over them.  Finally they let motorcycle riders keep
their lights on.  But, I don't know, in my mind, you know, things
would happen, tanks were breaking down, and all this, in my mind I was
thinking things were screwed up, but I was just one little section,
but the overall picture of the whole maneuvers, according to the
umpires, our battalion was superior over all the rest of the units
down there.  And general Patton, old famous Patton, he was the one
that selected us to go to the Philippines.  Thats my understanding.
Thats the reason we went over there.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> OK.  I guess when I interrupted you there, you were talking about
the training at Fort Knox.  You were talking about the maneuvers at
Louisiana so you actually do well and he selects you and you're going
to go overseas, allright, when'd you hear about that and what happened?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well the maneuvers were over with and we pulled into bivouac
area near Fort Polk, Louisiana. We pitched pup tents because they
hadn't built that post up yet enough to house all the people.  Anyway,
after we pulled off maneuvers and went in there then we got the word
that we were going to San Francisco, but we didn't know where we were
really going. And they gave us all two weeks leave.  So I come home
and my brother who was two years older, Edward, he was two years older
than I am.  He had a back problem and was here at Fort Knox hospital
and they wanted to give him a discharge on account of his back.  I
don't exactly know what his problem was.  Anyway, he refused to take a
medical discharge, so while I was home on leave he went to Louisiana.
While he was down there he helped the guys that was there to draw all
our equipment.  In fact they issued all new tanks, new trucks, new
jeeps, new motorcycles, and everything else.  Then when I went off
leave back down to Fort Polk we got on a train and went to San
Francisco.  We got to San Francisco in September or October, I'm not
sure, it was somewhere, then from San Francisco to 
Fort McDowell (sp?), they called it Angels Island, and it was more or less
repo-depot (sp?)  for the people going overseas and the people coming
back from the Philippines, China or wherever they was at.  We stayed
there several days.  Meantime we was, the maintenance section had to
go from there back over to San Francisco and help load all our
equipment on a ship.  Meantime we was taking physicals, getting shots,
and people being examined, some of the married guys was being
discharged, anybody that had a problem with their lungs they was
holding them.  We had a guy Horace Hargon, they found a spot on his
lung so they pulled him off and he didn't go with us.  Come to find
out, it wasn't anything serious and he ended up in some other unit,
and went some other place.  But I think, as well as I could recall, he
was the only one that got pulled off shipping overseas.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> That was Kenneth's brother?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  After that we got on the ship and headed out to wherever we
was going.  We got to Hawaii and went in Pearl Harbor and stayed there
about four days.  We was waiting on another ship to catch up with us.
After we left Hawaii we went from there to Guam, we went blackout from
there to Guam because evidently they suspected the Japanese was
patrolling them waters or something.  And from Guam we went on into
Manila.  Blackout all the way. We got to Manila, I think it was on
something like Thanksgiving day, well as I can recall.  We got off the
ship and got on a train and went to Fort Stotsinburgh (sp?), thats at
Clark's Field, they call it Clark's Field now.  I think the people
that were there, the 194th tank battalion was already there, and
they'd cooked up a big Thanksgiving meal for us.  That was about
25-November as well as I can recall and from that day until December 7
we worked like nothing you ever seen, day and night, Saturdays and
Sundays and everything else getting our equipment together because we
had to mount all the machine gun and all the radios and get everything
in our tanks.  On the day that the Japanese bombed Clark Field we had
just finished up putting our last machine guns on our halftrack.  That
day, December 8, well December 8 was the day they actually packed us
because on December 7 was when they got Pearl Harbor.  We was in the
mess hall up there eating chow that day at noon time, and I'd just got
through eating and I was assigned, uh, my vehicle was a motorcycle,
that's what I crew chiefed in maintenance, that's what I was supposed
to ride.  Come out of mess hall, was looking at my motorcycle, somebody
said, "Oh, look at them Navy bombers!".  We was all looking at them,
it was beautiful flying up there in formation.  There was about 50
some-odd of them, as well as I can recall.  And about time we looked
at them real good, we heard some making a whistling, hissing sound,
falling, about the next thing we seen was buildings, people,
airplanes, and everything else going up in the sky because they was,
they started bombing Clark Field.  Immediately after this bombing raid
then the fighter planes came in and started strafing the heck out of
everything.  That was at noon.  This lasted until about 4 or 5
o'clock.  It was about 4 hours all together, I guess, something like
that.  Them fighter planes would come in, they'd leave, then they'd
come back.  It made about, I don't know, about 2 or 3 runs on us there
that afternoon.  The only thing I can say where they come from was off
an aircraft carrier sitting off out there someplace.  Thats the only
thing I can think of.  I never did really know where they came from.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> <181>They came from Formosa, some of them.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, wherever they come from.  But anyway, they really tore the
Air Force up.  They killed, I don't know, an awful lot of people.
Them B-17's was setting on the runway with their engines running,
loaded, the crews in them.  I was told, I don't know it be the truth
or not, that they couldn't get orders to take off.  Before they could
get off though most of them had already got blown up or burned up.
You might know this story about Captain Kelley?  They took one B-17
off and dived it into one of their ships out there in Lingayan.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Colin P. Kelley?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> I've heard the story.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well there was, I don't know, 4, 5, 6 maybe B-17s that wadn't
destroyed.  But they didn't last too long because the Japanese had air
superiority and we had P-40s and they blowed just about all them, they
killed just about all of them.  A lot of them on that field and other
fields around Luzon.  They just about blasted all of them.  We had a
few left and them P-40s, they were so fast that if they didn't get the
Zero on the first pass it would take them 10 miles to recover and make
a turn and come back.  By that time the Zero would be gone.  Them
Zero's could slow up and they could really speed up.  They just could
just plain out-maneuver them P-40s, thats all there was to it.
<p>
That day we had some things happen.  We had a boy named Brooks.  The
parade field at Fort Knox is named after him.  He was the first
armored personnel killed during WWII.  That young man was my half-track
driver.  He was over at the tank talking to some of the crew, they
came in there and started bombing and he run across the airfield
trying to get back to his halftrack and that's when a bomb fell behind
him and, I think it almost blowed his head off and blowed off one of
his arms.  He never knew what hit him.  I mean, it just really smacked
him.  He was the only person we got, actually got hurt that day.  We
had our tanks, well, about 2-3 days before they actually bombed Clark
Field and Stotsinburgh (sp?), they had deployed out tanks around Clark
field because, for some reason or another, they thought the Japs were
going to drop paratroopers on Clark Field.  But they didn't drop them
on Clark field but it was a mountain off in the distance they called
Mount O'Riot (sp?). They did drop paratroopers on it but I think the
Philippino people captured or killed everyone of them.  I don't think
there was any of them that got away.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> When did they drop those?  After the bombing?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah. Well it wasn't that same day, it was about, it seemed like a
few days after they bombed Clark field they came in there.  The
Japanese had air superiority.  They come in there, fly any time they
wanted to with anything they wanted to because we had a lot of enemy
aircraft gun and we shot a lot of their planes down.  <222> They
didn't have nothing, the p-40s, we had a few of them, but they wadn't
no match for them Zeros.  They could run fast, or they could go slow
and their maneuverability was just plain out of this world.  The P-40
didn't have a Chinamans chance with them Zeros.  We shot a lot of
their fighter planes down and we shot a lot of their bombers down but
they had the air superiority and they could do whatever they wanted to
do.  They could bomb us, strafe us, anytime they felt like it.
<p>
Clark Field...  That day I seen a...  Well, I tell you what, they was
about the scaredest I ever was in my life that day.  After they
dropped them bombs I go on a motorcycle and went from mess hall and
started back down to the motor pool and they dropped the bombs in our
PO oil (sp?) dump where we had oil and gasoline and all that stored.
That was the awfulest explosion and fire and smoke.  I layed the
motorcycle down and got in a ditch.  This fuel and oil <240> <missed
some here> circled around and coming down in the ditch here where I'm
laying.  The Japanese was strafing the road and it was so smoke and
dusty that I had to put on my gas mask.  We carry them all the time
anyway.  I took out my 45 and I was shooting at anything;  anything
that come over!  I was so scared that I didn't know my name I don't
think.  After that day as the time went along, I mean I was always
leery, but I never was scared that much anymore.  That was my baptism
by fire, I guess.  I seem a guy, an old Philippino come staggering
down the road, he was drunk, intoxicated, or whatever you want to call
it, he was holding up his hand, "V..V..Wargames, Wargames!" and last
time I seen him he was still staggering down the road and them Zeros
just strafing the heck out of that street and road down through there.
As far as I know, he never did get hit.  He thought it was war games!
Right across the street it was an antiaircraft unit setup.  They had
50-caliber machine guns.  They was firing these fighters and bombers
and doing everything.  This one guy jumped off this mount and started
to run and another guy got on that gun and wheeled it around and
flattened that guy right out.  I was just lying across the street and
seen all that.  I never did say nothing about that because he could
have brought that thing around and let me have it at the same time.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You mean he aimed at one of the friendly forces?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah!  This guy that jumped off that gun and started running.
This other guy got on that gun and wheeled it around and took him
right down... he was running away from him...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> What it an accident?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No!  He done it on purpose!
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was it someone from Company D? or...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No, No, it was ...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Air defense unit?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, I don't recall which one it was.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was he shooting at him because he was running, do you think?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah. Yeah.  Cowardly act in time of combat, running in the face
of the enemy, or whatever you want to call it.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was he hollering at him or anything?  Did you hear him hollering at
him say "get back on the gun" or anything?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No. There was so much noise...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> How far away from you was it when you saw it?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> It was about ...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> 100 yards or less?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No, it was less than that.  It was about 25 yards!  It was about
as close as here, well, about 25 yards, I guess.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Did it kill him?  The soldier?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> I don't know.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Knocked him down anyway.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  He went down.  Last time I seen him he was still laying
there.  But there were people laying all over the place.  Where they
got shot from strafing, and bomb shrapnel, stuff like that.  Nobody'd
ever associate that guy shooting him with a 50 caliber machine gun.
They'd just chalk it up that the Japanese shot him by strafing or
something like that.  So, I thought to myself, "my god, if that guy
sees me, he'll probably wheel around here and let me have it!"  So as
soon as I could I got on my motorcycle and motored out of that place!
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Where were you at this time?  Near the motor pool?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  Right near the motor pool.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Where's the motor pool located as far as the NCO?  Where you in the
MCO mess when they started bombing?  Was that where you were?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No, I was in the mess hall.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> OK.  Where was the mess hall located on the field generally?  Was
it on the north side, south, east, west?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, I tell you what, it was about west, lets see, it was about
west from Clarks field.  But it wasn't but about 300 yards from
Clark's field.  No it was less than that, about 200 yards from Clarks
field.  It was about in the center of our post, or where we was at.
We was... well, Stotsinburgh (sp?) was coming to the east of us, no
about north...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Well, when they started bombing initially, how far did you have to
go to get to where you were going to go to the motor pool there?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh it wadn't no distance, it wadn't very far at all.  It wadn't
over, say, 200 yards from the mess hall.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> And that's where you went when you went to motor pool.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, I went from the mess hall and went out and got on the road
and they hit the PO oil dump and I hit the ditch.  I stayed right
there until they quit strafing.  Then I got on the motorcycle...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> OK.  That my question.  The first bombs that came in, the heavy
bomb, the high altitude bombing, how close did they hit to the mess
hall and to you all?  Some distance away?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> They were at least 200 yards away.  They was strictly bombing the
buildings...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> 200 yards is not very far.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, no its not very far, buts that about how close it was.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> The initial round, the initial bombs.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> So debris was flying by you then...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh it was all over the place.  You could see people being blowed
in the air and, like you say, it was really something to see to never
see nothing like that before!  You see bodies and arms and legs.
Well, I understand, I think the first initial bomb, they dropped right
in the big consolidated mess.  You could see this...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Another mess hall.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  In that big mess hall.  In another one.  Yeah, the Air
Force, not ours.  They never did touch our mess hall.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> How close was that mess hall to your mess hall?  Do you know?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> It was about 2 or 300 yards.  It wadn't too far away.  Well, say,
like Clark Field was in this area, our barracks were sitting like
this.  It wadn't no distance at all from here to Clark Field.  Then
the runway was off down here, see.  We were just right here, a very
short distance down to the buildings, Clark Field and the whole bit.
We was all pretty well congested in one area right there.
<p>
<334>
<em>AK:</em>  You were outside the mess hall looking up at that formation when
you heard the noise.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You heard the noise then it was going to hit the ground pretty
shortly there after, then you're going to see the explosions. The
first thing that you saw when they exploded, was that hitting the mess
hall?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, it seemed like the zeroed right in on the big consolidated
mess.  All the personnel of the Air Force at that time, Army-Air
Force, I guess, they all eat in that big mess.  They just had that one
mess hall for the whole Clark's Field.  It seemed like they
concentrated their bombing right on that mess hall. Then the bombs
trail off down into the maintenance buildings and the aircraft and
down the runway and that area.  It was the awfulest, I don't know how
many bombs dropped in there, but it was a whole lot of them, with 50
some-odd planes.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Did you hit the ground immediately or were you laying on the
ground?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well no, normally...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> I mean, the shock, you were kind of standing there when those
things were falling and looking at them and they were still falling.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, we just stood there, we were spell-bound.  We didn't know..
Oh my god, It's hard telling..., I don't know what I said.  They
weren't dropping were we was at.  So I got on my motorcycle and
started out a road, I had to go one street, turn right, and down
another street to get back to the motor pool.  As I went up this
street and turned then the fighters started coming in there.  They was
right in behind the bombers.  They started strafing the daylights out
of things.  They hit the POL dump over there.  We had a big ditch
alongside that road...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> About how much fuel did you have in that POL dump?  Is it just the
battalion POL dump?  POL dump for the whole concern?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> For the whole place, yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Aircraft included?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No. No, they had their POL...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> I'm just trying to find out about how much POL you are talking
about, you talking about thousands of gallons or hundreds of gallons?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, thousands of gallons of high octane gas for our tanks,
trucks, things like that.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> How close were you when it hit that POL?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> I guess I was in 100 yards.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> And that fire almost reached out and grabbed you then didn't it?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> You're not kidding.  It just almost blowed me down.  Thats how bad
and I could see that stuff. They had it pretty well ditched around it.
The drainage there was, where them drums, all the things that they
held the fuel in was blowing up and this fuel was burning and running.
There was a big ditch.  I could see that stuff coming through that
ditch.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Toward you?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah! I thought to myself "Am I going to lay here and get burn up?
or I'm gonna get out of here and get killed on the strafing on this
road?"  Before that ever got to me the strafing just about quit.  I
got up and took off and got back to the motor pool.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> How far is that to the motor pool?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Not very far, about, I'd say, 100 yards or less.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You ran over to the motor pool.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> I rode my motorcycle over there.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Oh.  You drove your motorcycle.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em>  You were doing to hang on to your motorcycle come hell or high
water.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> You're not kidding!
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Why were you so determined to get to the motor pool?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Because everything, all my men, and everybody else was there.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Get back to your area of responsibility.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> When you got to the motor pool what'd you find?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, got down there.  Hadn't nothing been hit of ours.  I knew
all our tanks were around Clark Field.  I don't know.  We didn't get
nobody hurt except this boy named Brooks.  He was already out at the
field in the halftrack.  At that time we had a halftrack in the
maintenance section.  He was out there with a couple of mechanics.
They was maintaining their tanks and things like that.  So I got on
the motorcycle and went out around Clark's Field in the area where our
company was, to see what had happened.  We didn't have no tanks or
nothing like that get, we got some of them, got shrapnel dents and
things like that, but nobody hurt.  Like I said the only person got
hurt was Brooks.  We got orders to move everything out of the compound
from where we were stationed there in Stotsinburgh (sp?) to bivouac.
We had to move out. So that afternoon we vacated that post and never
went back again.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> When you were making your round to see see what, to assess the
damage, I assume, did you run into the sight where Brooks was injured
or killed?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Did you see Brooks?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You saw his body?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  He got, well he was running across the runway, that's what
he was doing.  The tanks was around the airfield, the airfield was
long, you know how runways, this side, up this side.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Both sides of the runway... spread out...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> He had a halftrack parked on the opposite side of the airfield
where our tanks were (lost some here...)  He kinda in the
maintenance area where we, if we had any problem, we'd bring our tanks
in that area and maintain them.  Just minor problems we'd fix them
where they were set up out there around the runway. He was over at the
tank talking to somebody, or something, I don't know, and the bombs
started falling.  He made a run across the runway to get back to his
halftrack because we had machine guns, 50 caliber machine guns,
mounted on that just for that purpose.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You think he was going to get on a machine gun to engage...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, he was trying to get back to it.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Brooks worked for you?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was he a good soldier?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> He was a black soldier and the only black.  Did you know he was
black at that time?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, he told me.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> He told you?  He didn't tell the rest of them, though, did he?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Did you keep that a secret?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  I just kept it to myself.  He told me not to tell nobody so
I never did mention it.  I knew he was black all the time.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Well, you know, at that time the army wadn't integrated.  Did that
cause any concern of yours?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Nobody thought nothing about it.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> They didn't think anything about it at all.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You were glad to have him as good troop.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well sure. All through my army career I never felt no prejudice
against anybody, black, yellow, I didn't care.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Even before the integration.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> That's right.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> I mean, that was just your attitude.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, I never...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Did any of the other men in Company D know that Brooks was black? 
Do you think?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> As far as I know, I was the only one that knew about it, as far as
I know.  There may have been more...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> That suspected it, right?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, a possibility.  It's hard to tell, its hard to detect if he
was black though.  Its pretty hard...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> He was light complected?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> He was light, really light, yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> How long did he work for you?  From the time you went to Fort Knox
until you was..
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  He went through basic training. You know, give him his
basic training there in November 40.  Then he went through the track
field mechanics school then he come back to the unit.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was he a pretty good mechanic?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, he was pretty good.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> As far as maintaining those tanks, those farmers from Harrodsburg
had had a lot of experience maintaining equipment and you'all were
pretty good at that I take it.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> I knew them tanks inside, I could, like the the old saying, you
know, field strip your machine gun blindfolded?  Them tanks, I knew
them that well, engine, transmission, everything.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Had you much mechanical experience as a young person?  You worked
on a farm didn't you?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.  I could always adapt mechanical things.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You were kind of a mechanic before you went to the mechanical
school on the tanks.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah. I could always fix just about anything.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Was that true of the other tankers from Harrodsburg?  Were they
pretty good mechanics?  Because of there farm experience,  generally
speaking, I mean, you been in the army 20 years and you know how
things are...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, as far as I know they was pretty good.  Now my brother, he
was a mechanic also.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> What was his name?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Edward, Edward T.  We went through the armor school together.
When we got out of there we graduated top of our class and they wanted
us to stay there as instructors.  We said "No way buddy!".
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Gotta go with that company...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Thats right! And if we had any idea that things gonna happen like
they did we might have had second thoughts about it!  We could have
both stayed there as instructors and probably stayed there all during
the war.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You wanted to go back with company D because of the Harrodsburg
connections?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah. That was the only place for us.  Now he was in headquarters
company.  See, when they mobilized us they got personnel out of each
company to make headquarters company.  He was a crew chief of a team
from battalion maintenance that went around to company maintenance.
We could do so much then battalion would do the rest of it.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> OK.  Morgan, that first experience that frightened you out of your
wits, and would frighten anybody out of their wits, and the stress of
the destruction that just sort of descends on a group of people and
lasts for 4 hours, was that strafing pretty intense for the whole 4
hours?  but sometimes there was some, I guess, there's some little
slack time in between...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, no, there'd just maybe be a few minutes before the next raid
would come in.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> So you'all were under quite a bit of pressure.  You know,
sometimes, in this severe combat situation where there's destruction
everywhere, you know, there's some, it exceeds peoples mental limits
and, you know, some people suffer combat fatigue, as they called it,
sometimes called shell shock in World War 1.  Did you see any of that?
Apparently it scared the dickens out of you, but you got right, you
were always oriented toward your duty, you went to your motor pool,
then you went around to see what damage was done to your tracks.  Just
within yourself and other people, the stress of it, can you describe
some of that?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well, I was always on my toes, but I never did get to a point
where I didn't know what I was doing or anything like that.  I was
fortunate, I guess.  Yes I seen a lot of grown men cry like a small
kid.  Crawl away from...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> You're talking about the prisoners or subsequent duty, or you
talking about right now at Clark Field?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> I'm talking about right off the bat.  It may be mean hombre's in
peacetime but as soon as them bullets start flying they just turn 180
degrees or 360 or whatever you want to call it.  There was a few in
our company like that, but I ain't gonna call no names or anything
like that.
<p>
<em>AK:</em>  In other words, it was so severe and so intense that it exceeded
some of them's limit, momentarily, anyway.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Are you talking about 1 percent or 2 percent or are you talking
about...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Oh, less than that.  In our company of, lets see we had 103-4
people in the company, talking about draftees and our
(missed something).  Out of our company there was about 3 people that
was...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> It exceeded there mental limits...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Thats right.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> And stressed them to a breaking point, to some degree.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah. They just wadn't worth a dime.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> From that time on? Or just during that brief period?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> From that time on.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Throughout the whole war.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Up until we got captured.  Yeah, they just took them and put them
in the mess hall.  They more or less done KP duty and stuff like that
just to keep them out of the way.  You couldn't do nothing else with
them, wadn't no place else to send them, see.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Well, they were still able to function then...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah but...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> I mean, it didn't, sometimes it'll drive them completely out of
there mind...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> They'd run away, you know...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> They'd take them out with a straight jacket.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Well no, we didn't have nobody that bad off.  I had one guy in my
maintenance section.  His name was, he was from Dayton, OH, name was
Ross Casnaw (sp?). I don't mind telling this.  I mean, the guy wadn't
scared now,  I mean, he was scared too, and we'd get penned down on a
bombing raid where we get in a fox hole or just lay flat on the ground
and that guy, I don't care what you'd do, he'd have to get up and run.
It wadn't away from the enemy, he just had to run, thats all there was
to it!  He was libel to run toward the enemy as he would to run away
from the enemy.  When they started dropping them bombs, forget it.  He
was not staying on the ground.  He never did get hit.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> He'd run through out the whole action.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah!  Never got hit.  I threatened him sometime, I said "if you
don't lay still..." I said, "you get up I'm going to shoot you".  He
said "Ok, Ok, I don't mean to do that, I don't know why I do it, but I
just can't stay there".  Every time artillery or anything, we'd get
penned down, he'd have to get up and run.  He might run circles, but
he wouldn't stay there!
<600>
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Allright.  Talk about the three that had the problems that went
back to the mess hall and it stayed with them throughout the action,
the delaying action, from Lingayan gulf into Bataan and till the
surrender.  Could you see that there'd been some psychological damage
done?  Did they have a stare that was different or did they recover
and pretty much go on about their business?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> No they didn't have no stare, I know what you're talking about.
No they didn't have nothing like that. When they got up there in the
lines, bullets were flying, bombs were falling, they just...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Go to pieces again?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah, they just...
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Anytime there was severe combat...
<p>
<em>MF:</em> They just go all to pieces.  Like having a nervous breakdown.
Just sull up, or, I don't know , they just plain wadn't there,
thats all there was too it.  Once the danger was over they pretty well
come back to themself.  You couldn't depend on them to help you out in
case you got into a tight spot.  So the company commander busted them
back to privates and put in the mess hall.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> And they stayed there the whole time?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Were any of those from Harrodsburg?
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Yeah.
<p>
<em>AK:</em> Some from Harrodsburg, some draftees too.
<p>
<em>MF:</em> Right.
<p>
<641>  
<End Of Tape 1 Side 1>
<hr>
End of Audio Tape 1 Side 1